Like a zombie that can't be killed, the $70-an-hour autoworker lie is alive and well, roaming the media landscape -- and still being peddled by The New York Times in Monday's edition.
As Media Matters and other critics reported last week, it's a conservative myth concocted by totaling all wages, plus health and benefit costs to current workers and 450,000 retirees and their families -- and then deceptively dividing that huge total payout by the number of current UAW workers, about 140,000 in Detroit.
Here's what the Times said today in an article about the autoworkers considering concessions:
Some critics have taken aim at the automakers' hourly labor costs, which average more than $70 for senior workers, including wages and the value of benefits like pensions and health care.
Those costs run closer to $46 an hour at nonunion plants like Toyota's factory in Georgetown, Ky., and are even less at newer plants farther South, where foreign automakers have pegged wages closer to local rates.
In fact, as I and others previously reported, The Big Three true labor costs are on the way to matching those offered by non-union Japanese plants in the U.S.
It bears repeating what Media Matters' Eric Boehlert said on the political uses of this myth:
As Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) pointed out during congressional hearings last week, "There is apparently a cultural condition that's more ready to accept aid to a white-collar industry than the blue-collar industry, and that has to be confronted."
That cultural condition seems to extend to, and be embraced by, today's white-collar press corps.Make no mistake: The $70-an-hour claim represents a classic case of conservative misinformation. It's also a very dangerous one. The falsehood about autoworkers is being spread at a crucial time, when a make-or-break public debate is taking place, a debate that could affect millions of American workers.
What will it take for the mainstream media to accurately report on the actual labor costs in Detroit while Congress is considering whether to give the Big Three a bailout?
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The Senate and Congress is supposed to represent American citizens and safeguard our individual rights. One of those rights is to be able to negotiate salary with an employer, whether done individual
Today our legislatur
Economic times are tough now, and won't get better in the near future. But that is NOT a good reason to DICTATE wages for anyone.
By the way, our Senate and Congressio
}}}And I am saying that perhaps the "facts" should be changed to include these figures & things will be more evenly ironed out.{{{
Oh, how SILLY of me to think that such UNCHANGABL
You obviously don't understand what a fact or the truth are! Labor costs are, by their very name, any cost that you incur employing people. They have NOTHING to do with contractua
In addition to this, you are DELIBERATE
"In 2004, the last full year for data, GM's worldwide payrolls from continuing operations totaled $21.5 billion, up from $20.9 billion in 2003. In the United States, hourly payroll totaled $8.7 billion. The average labor cost per hour for the U.S. hourly work force, which includes both wages and benefits, was $73.73 in 2004."
So to claim that this is a myth perpetuate
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Second, you are trusting the labor figures of a company which has been trying to break up the unions for DECADES now..... rather than ANY sort of logic or brainpower
"Some critics have taken aim at the automakers
That is the direct quote. Notice:
A. This is including things like pensions and health care.
B. This is NOT A SALARY FIGURE. This is a labor cost figure.
C. Of course these go into the total cost of the car. Who cares if you call them "labor" costs or operating costs or carebear costs. All the pensions and health benefits go into the cost of the product, which in turn affects its price. The author of the NYT article is talking about the costs of making a product, not how much someone earns.
D. It's stupid ridiculous to think that auto workers should get paid when they are no longer working. That only makes sense if you're an auto worker. Pension packages are nice, but they are a huge burden to companies and are usually the first to go. The problem is if the company makes a move to save its own ass, the union leaders immediatel
Certain union personalit
Nope. I value the union for giving workers parity against owners. If owners can't keep companies afloat they should first see why their CEOs need gazillions for sitting in air conditione
Nope. "Ya can't scare me! I'm sticking with the union!!!" -- Woody Gutherie
On one small point we disagree. In many contracts, especially a few decades ago, pension payments were not (salary - pension + company contributi
The article did not say these people take home $46/hr and I cannot believe that they do as this would equate to $90,000+ per year. $46/hr includes benefits and overhead, still way above what you make, but is the problem your low wages or the higher wages of the others?
However, I would argue that this figure creates a perception that previously earned pension costs can be removed through bargaining with the UAW about current employees and this is not the case.
Yes, the overhead in the american auto companies is high and should be reduced, but that cannot be done through reducing what current auto workers earn. The only way for taxpayers to assess whether the UAW should make concession
By the way, pension funding is a management decision. Management could have fully funded these liabilitie
.
In summary, the $70 per hour employee cost is a fact, not a myth, and your assertion that the Big 3 are already on their way to becoming as employee cost efficient is Toyota and Honda is simply a lie. If you think it's not a lie, back it up with numerical support and cite your sources.
The absurdity of ANY blue collar worker opposing strong unions in ALL aspects of employment in the US is sad indicator of just how willfully ignorant people will be in order to get the quick gratificat
So it's not a myth, it's a fact. If people are too dumb to recognize the difference between hourly employee cost and hourly employee wage then your article should address the public's failure to understand basic economic principles
As you mentioned "The Big Three true labor costs are on the way to matching those offered by non-union Japanese plants in the U.S.". OK, this is the myth. Yes their have been some cutbacks, but not far enough and not soon enough. GM is apparently claiming it may go under any moment, so why not initiate these cutbacks now, not at some future point that is "on the way". Also, even the planned cutbacks will not be sufficient to get down to the low $40 per hour employee cost ratio of Toyota and Honda (readers please not that Levine never even makes the claim that these cuts ever will achieve actual parity with their competitio
continued.
The unions have been getting hammered for 15-20 years. The pendulum has swung. It's time to have some respect for the hard working Americans.
When Detroit started manufactur
The reason that they preferred to sell the guzzlers is because they made a somewhat higher profit MARGIN on those, so that they didn't have to sell as many to make more profit!! And that's why they spent so much money on advertisin
If the non-big three don't have this cost as they apparently don't, then it is a cost of "labor past and present" that they clearly don't share. I agree that lumping this in with current wages and somehow tying it to hourly production costs is a bit deceitful, but who suffers from this deceit?
Electricit
Water. Needed for both drinking and for bathrooms. Again, ESSENTIAL, but not labor.
Supplies. The stuff needed to make the cars. ABSOLUTELY essential, since without this you won't have ANY cars, but NOT a labor cost!
The retiree costs are simply administra
Well, shouldn't the cost of the STEEL that goes into a car built in, say, 1980, be
costed to 1980? Shouldn't the cost of the GLASS that went into a car built in
1985 be attributed to that particular car, or group of cars? Shouldn't the cost
of servicing borrowed funds to build a vehicle in 1990 be put in the ledger for
1990?
Of course!
And if any business ever tried to put these kinds of costs into the ledger for
years downstream
in those early years, and disbursed dividends, and so on, it would be
correctly viewed as a Ponzi scam and derided in the financial press.
The question is not where the costs of labor for a car built in 1993, or
1961, or 2003 should be assigned, it's why we have stood by mute for
a half century while all of the big three have engaged in this Ponzi scam,
and why we tolerate the nonsense of blaming the UAW for GM's phony
accounting techniques
If the company's pension fund cannot meet that, it's not a ponzi scheme for them to have to meet the contractua